Xi says China will meet its economic goals, Sanders tightens hold on Democratic nomination, and Europe's manufacturing slump worsens. Expressing optimism President Xi Jinping said that China has the ability to accomplish its economic growth and social development goals, and will "defeat the epidemic." Xi's optimism is not shared by economists outside the country who have cut their growth forecasts as the effects from the outbreak are worse than first thought. The toll from the virus, now named COVID-19 by the World Health Organisation, continues to rise with latest figures showing more than 1,100 people have died and over 45,000 confirmed cases worldwide. Sanders winsResults from the New Hampshire primary showed Bernie Sanders leading by more than one percentage point over second place Pete Buttigieg. The strong performance by Amy Klobuchar, who finished third, was one of the big surprises of the night. Joe Biden finished fifth, with his campaign apparently in freefall. Tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang dropped out of the race. Slump Manufacturing in the euro area ended 2019 with the deepest slump in almost four years, with industrial production dropping 2.1% in December from a year earlier. Worryingly for policymakers, the dismal numbers came in the period ahead of the COVID-19 outbreak, which means any quick turnaround is unlikely. Those same fears are also starting to edge up for the U.S., with Bloomberg Economics' recession prediction model showing an increase in the chances of a reversal in growth. They do, however, point to a raft of temporary factors, rather than anything structural in the forecast. Markets riseVirus fears and manufacturing slowdowns are not enough to derail the continuing good run for global equities. Overnight the MSCI Asia Pacific Index climbed 0.5% while Japan's Topix index closed broadly unchanged. In Europe the Stoxx 600 Index was 0.4% higher at 5:50 a.m. Eastern Time with cyclical stocks posting the biggest gains. S&P 500 futures pointed to more green at the open and the 10-year Treasury yield was at 1.609%. Greece's 10-year bond yield traded below 1% for the first time ever. Coming up…Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell is in Congress for his second day of testimony. Philadelphia Fed President Patrick Harker is also due to talk on the economic outlook this morning. OPEC will publish its monthly market review that will be closely watched for forecasts of the drop in demand from China. The U.S. monthly budget statement for January is published at 2:00 p.m. Cisco Systems Inc. and CVS Health Corp. are among the companies reporting earnings. What we've been readingThis is what's caught our eye over the last 24 hours. And finally, here's what Luke's interested in this morningPerhaps the most remarkable phrase to come out of Fed Chair Jerome Powell's testimony Tuesday was his admission that the Fed would "never" say it had accomplished the goal of making sure anyone who wants to work and can work will have a job available to them. It's the latest in a series of rhetorical wins for activists who have tried to ensure the maximum-employment component of the dual mandate doesn't get short shrift to the price-stability part, through a ceiling for the job market that's built unduly low. That's because many (but not all) current Fed officials in recent years have done just that: declared the economy to be "at or beyond full employment." So did the Powell-chaired central bank's February 2018 Monetary Policy Report. The Chair's recent remarks speak to a struggle over how to appropriately define full employment that has persisted for decades, and signs of a shift in communications from the central bank on this front. There are also some potential practical implications. The Fed's prior mentality, which was acted upon via multiple rate hikes even in the relative absence of an aggressive move upwards in price pressures, presupposes that the magnitude of the labor market gains that have been made since were not possible or sustainable. Never declaring full employment has been achieved would reinforce the view that realized inflation is a prerequisite for tightening and constitute a more structural change to the central bank's reaction function. More broadly, if the Fed now isn't ever able to say it's effectively accomplished an expansive but intuitive definition of one of the tasks Congress has set for them, this may start to shift some of the onus on achieving this objective back to the legislative entity.  Like Bloomberg's Five Things? Subscribe for unlimited access to trusted, data-based journalism in 120 countries around the world and gain expert analysis from exclusive daily newsletters, The Bloomberg Open and The Bloomberg Close. | 
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